Montgomery Revamps Open Space Grant Rules Municipalities Now Will Compete For Funds Instead Of Proportional Disbursement.

September 08, 2000|By TIM DARRAGH, The Morning Call

The Montgomery County Commissioners are looking to spread the open space wealth.

Commissioners Thursday re-established the program to provide open space grants to municipalities and private nonprofit organizations.

But in re-establishing certain regulations that technically expired in the county's open space ordinance, the commissioners set new guidelines that significantly change it, said Michael Stokes, county Planning Commission assistant director.

Now all of the county's 62 municipalities will be able to compete for the funding, whereas in the past, open space funds were divided proportionately to each community, he said.

Additionally, the commissioners decided to put more of the cost of open space purchases on the municipalities and nonprofits. In the past, a municipality could seek funding for an open space purchase and get the county to pay 90 percent. Now, the county will pay 70 percent and the municipality 30 percent, Stokes said.

Likewise, a private, nonprofit organization used to get the county to pay 85 percent of the cost of an open space purchase. Now, costs will be split 50-50, Stokes said.

According to Stokes, the county is reducing its contributions on a percentage basis because officials believe municipalities and nonprofits have more opportunities to secure state, federal and private funding.

Additionally, the county could `help more municipalities get involved in more projects` this way, he said.

About $3 million of the $10.7 million that commissioners allocated in the capital budget for open space purchases is available, Stokes said.

"We really want to fund the best projects -- larger tracts of land connected to others that would have a large, county benefit," he said.

The first deadline under the new funding regulations is Nov. 1, Stokes said.